Have a Nice Day
by IzzBot
Summary: A series of moments. MikeScott. Time is blurred as Mike thinks of Scottie. Oneshot.


A/N: This is more a series of vignettes that are loosely connected. They aren't quite in chronological order, to the movie or to each other. Time is somewhat relative.

Disclaimer: I don't have any rights to "My Own Private Idaho."

--

I walk. The road feels like hot coals and my feet scream in agony, flesh burning and searing. I have no shoes. The sun is hot and everything is sizzling – my brain is on fire.

Everything is in front of me and everything is behind me. I am alone on a road that goes on forever. A fucked up face with fucked up eyes stares at me, smiling, telling me to have a nice fucking day.

I wish Scottie were here.

And then I am on the ground.

--

It is six months ago. I am wrapped around him tight, the roar of the motorcycle beneath me. His dark hair whips at my face and I have to turn my head away. He is laughing.

I don't know where I am. I don't know where I am going. I try not to think where I have been. All I know is that I am safe.

A light is glaring red and the hair is still and the machine is silent. The world turns up side down and I slide down the bike. I hit the pavement.

--

Everything is quiet and still and fresh. There is dew underneath my fingers and dampness in the air. It is night.

Dark eyes are watching me and I crane my neck up to meet them. Scottie smiles. "Wake up, Mikey. It's a new day. Smell the sweet fragrance of the prosperity that awaits us."

I want to rest my eyes and settle into his arms once more. "It looks like night to me."

My friend unravels himself from me and stands up, brushing himself off. He looks like a giant. "It is only an illusion, my friend. Now wipe the slugs off your face and _come on._"

I stretch my legs out and shiver as the dew saturates my clothes. I notice Scottie's jacket strewn across me. I get up and follow him, jacket scrunched up in a ball in my arms.

I look up at the spattering of stars and go dizzy. The moon looks like the clipped off part of a nail. I have the urge to fly up into the sky, and I can almost feel myself rising slowly into the air, the wind carrying me along. I almost fall over but an arm snakes around my waist and holds me steady. I feel warm breath on my neck. "Let's get out of this godforsaken place, Mike, with its fakes and its phonies and its judgment. Let's get out of here and start a new life."

I hang on to his words, tethering me to reality. I let him set me up behind him on the bike. I rest my head on his shoulder and wrap my arms around him. A moment passes before I hear him start the engine. I don't fall asleep.

--

I am on a bed that smells too clean to be mine. I am warm and I am safe and I have a full meal in my belly. Not a sound to be heard except the incessant thumping from the next room. I try to shut out the noise, I sing to myself.

Scottie groans deep and long and I start to softly scream inside. I pray for sleep, for escape, but for once I find myself stuck in the conscious world. My eyes burn.

Moments are coming at me all too fast. I can see the past, I can see the future. Time is meaningless - it is all one big picture that I can examine. I don't like what I am seeing.

I am watching as Scottie drives off into the distance with his new love. He is abandoning me, he is betraying us. His crusade is over.

He looks ridiculous in an expensive suit, a tie –a chain- around his milky white throat. I no longer see my friend, a stranger has replaced him. Those dark eyes have turned cold and dead. And I can see inside his heart and know that it is likewise as icy. I search for a glimmer of hope, a sign of acknowledgement. I know it is futile. He is gone. His epitaph reads: Have a nice day.

--

I am meeting him for the first time. He looks beautiful to me. So utterly beautiful it makes me want to cry. I am young and alone and dirty… and he is perfection. He has yet to be tainted by this life.

I don't remember what happens next. I think there was a date involved… but isn't there always? I remember that he was laughing when he told me his name. He said he was the mayor's son. I did not believe him. I told him that he lied… that's where he laughed. And I laughed with him, and our voices mingled and wove together. It sounded like the sweetest music.

--

I am swept up in a wave of primal boys and men, voices shout and echo and reverberate around the earth and the sky. I let a powerful sound burst forth from my lungs. All the air is sucked out of my body as I let the terrific sound go on and on and on until I collapse onto the ground. I am smiling.

Scottie is sounding like a howling wolf next to me. He shakes his head and pounds his feet – calling to the other savage beasts of the night. He looks mystical.

I don't remember how I got here. The fat old man is trampling the wild grass a distance away, shouting at the wild boys surrounding him. They pay him no heed. It is a messy dance and song that they put forth, but it is brilliant.

Scottie has dragged me away from the untamed crowd, and we are surrounded by tall trees. I wonder how long they have been there. I think of them being cut down and paved over with cement for the new superhighway that is going to start being built in six months.

Scott collapses onto the ground with a happy sigh. "This is living, man."

I know that is not all and I settle down next to him. "The life that my father wants for me – that is not living. Someday, someday I will make him proud. I will be the perfect son. But I fear how trapped I will undoubtedly become," says Scott quietly.

His confident demeanor slips for a second and I study his face. He is laying close and his arm brushes mine. I think of how much I want to kiss him.

Scott asks me, "Do you like this life?"

I look up at the pattern of leaves swaying underneath the brightly lit stars. I whisper (not wanting to alarm the dancing leaves), "I don't… I don't think it matters. If I like it, I mean. This… these guys, this life… it's all I have. This is my life. There's no real way to change it, I don't think. So… yeah, I guess I like it. Although… someday, some far away day, I would like to be normal. Just a little bit of normal."

Scott studies me, his face serious. He asks, "A normal dog? You hope to have a normal dog someday, I know. Will a normal cat suffice?"

I roll my eyes at him, wrapping my arms around myself. I think back to that road – the road with the fucked up face. I don't know if I have been there before. But something happens on that road, something important. My eyes are shut tight. "Maybe I will have a family. Maybe I will be the normal dad and I can take my kids to soccer practice and be… normal. And that will be that."

I open my eyes when I feel an arm wrap around me. He pulls me towards him and I lay my head on his chest. I can already feel myself being pulled away from consciousness, forcefully so. My fingers start to twitch. Before I lose consciousness, I hear him say, "I don't think I want you to be normal, Mikey. I think you are just fine. Just fine…"

--

I am far away, and yet my body is frozen to this time, to this place. Scottie is saying something but I can't quite make it out.

We are outside, and it is cold. Very cold – I can see my breath form clouds in the air. And yet I am warm. Scott has been holding me and keeping me safe from the cold night. Yet again.

I sometimes wonder what compels him to watch out for me. Or even, why he chose to join our fucked up group and live our fucked up lives. He has all this money that is just waiting for him.

We all celebrate him and his fortune, we see ourselves rising above all this and being men of luxury. All because of Scott Favor, the mayor's son.

But my heart tells me that this is not to be. We, all of us, are stuck in the lives that have been planned for us. I am, and always will be, scum of the streets, selling my body and ghosting through life – never able to stay one place for too long. I am a drifter.

Scott, though, has success in his past and his future. He tries to reject that life, but he can not pretend to be someone who he is not. He has never been truly one of us. He has been our leader, yes, but we have never forgotten who he is, where he comes from.

I ignore his past… I dread the day he turns twenty-one. The day when his crusade will be over and he will find no reason to watch over me, to protect me from the dark cold night.

I pretend to be asleep so I can stay in his arms for just a little bit longer, take in his scent and his warmth, capture this moment of contentment – lock it away in my mind.

--

It is a moment of weakness. I kiss him.

He is delicious and beautiful and it feels so goddamn good to kiss somebody I actually want to kiss. It feels good not to be paid. I wish it was always like this.

My hands travel over his smooth skin and I push everything out of my mind but him. Only him. Only this moment, this time. There is no past, there is no future, and there are no consequences.

I love him, I do. And I know he says that two guys can't love each other – but I can't help myself. I know that this can't happen again, and I think I am okay with that. I just want him now; I just want him to be mine and only mine for a short while.

He lies on top of me, supporting himself by his elbows which are on either side of my head. His hair is wonderfully messy and they shield his eyes. Our lips meet for a tantalizing moment. I don't want it to end.

Everything has to end. But this moment will always be beautiful to me. And Scottie is, and always will be, beautiful. I love him, I do. Nothing he does will ever change that.

This is why it hurts, so much my heart sears with pain. My unhappy life has become unbearable. He leaves. And I love him. I clench my fists and am not surprised when I fall to the floor.

--

This road is never ending. I have been here before, and I will be here again. Something important happened here, but I don't know what.

The sun burns my skin, and the ground burns my feet. I am a body of sizzling, blistering flesh.

I wish Scott were here. I wish I had some shoes, or some water. My throat hurts.

The sky stretches for miles and miles until it merges with the brown of the earth. My vision is hazy.

I don't know how I got here, I don't even know where _here _is. All I know is that I've been here before. This road – I have seen this road before. It looks like no other road.

I hear a roar of a motorcycle in the distance and I don't dare hope.

Scottie.

The roar gets closer and closer, I can feel my whole body vibrate from the sound of it. I don't want to wish, I don't want to hope.

I stare at the fucked up face with sad eyes. I am resigned.

It stares back at me, telling me to have a nice day.

The roar stops.

--

A/N: Thanks for reading! Please review!


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